Wednesday 20 April 2016

Back on The Market

Hey guys. Bit of sad news if you haven't already heard. The Escapist has closed up its Connecticut office, and let go the vast majority of its staff. This, unfortunately, included me. I'm incredibly grateful to Susan Ardent, the EiC at the time of my appointment three years ago who took a chance on a cocky, young, smart-mouthed kid. Additionally, I'm thankful to Greg Tito and Joshua Vanderwall, Susan's successors, for fostering my writing and editing ability.

I am a thousand percent better of a writer thanks to this experience. You can write, and write, and write, but you will never get any better unless you have someone better than you look over your work. More than anything else, this is what I took from The Escapist, and it is ultimately this experience that will lead to me finding the job I want to do long term.

Here's the last article I wrote for them. So long, Escapist, it sure was fun while it lasted!

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So, I'm back on the market! Ideally, I would like to find something similar to what I did at The Escapist: video game-related freelance work that I can carry out from the comfort of my own home. That said, beggars can't be choosers, and while I do have a 1-year "safety net" of my teaching job, come April 2017 I will be back in Australia with no job, and my new wife. I will of course entertain all offers from all types of jobs around the world, as eventually I'll need to find myself a proper full-time gig to support myself.

If you know of anything, anything writing related, in either the US, Japan or Australia, please feel free to drop me a line.

In the interim, I'm going to take a short break from writing. Since being made editorial staff at the beginning of the year, I've been basically running myself ragged juggling the two jobs. It's good to actually have free time - to lesson plan at school, to spend time with Laura in the evenings, and of course play video games! I'm looking forward to my first holiday that I don't have to lug along my laptop just in case I have to write up an article...

Eventually though, I will start up writing again, if nothing else than to keep my skills keen, and my knowledge up-to-date. I will probably do something similar to what I used to do on this blog: a weekly news round-up with occasional features and reviews. After-all, it was in no small thanks to this blog that I ended up getting The Escapist position!

As always, thank you for all of your support, and stay tuned.

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